There are plenty of stories about Coventry you will have heard down the pub.

Or maybe they're tales you've been told by your gran, or claims made on fansites and forums.

Myths - including the more modern variation known as urban myths or urban legends - are widely-held beliefs that may or may not be true.

We decided to see if we could separate fact from fiction.

Here we look at 10 top myths you've probably heard about Coventry and Warwickshire

William Webb Ellis

It is believed that William Webb Ellis invented rugby at Rugby School in Warwickshire.

Legend has it that Webb Ellis created the sport in 1823, when he cheated during a game of football and impressed teachers with his innovation.

No contemporary account of Webb Ellis’s famous act exists, though, and he was never lauded as the inventor of the sport during his lifetime.

Michael Rowe, curator of the World Rugby Museum, said: “Webb Ellis is like the King Arthur of rugby. He is very important but as soon as you start to analyse the facts behind it, there is really very little or no evidence to support the story.

"Webb Ellis himself never made any claim to have invented the sport. But the reality of how rugby evolved is so complicated that people like a nice simple story to latch on to.”

The Coventry Panther

Coventry panther

Sightings of the Coventry Panther were reported back in 2010, but before that, the black animal has set tongues wagging for years.

It has been dubbed the Maxstoke Beast, the Pebworth Panther, the Beast of Claverdon and the Beast of Bubbenhall after numerous animal sightings over the years.

Guy is a fictional medieval hero who became a knight and battled incredible monsters to prove he was worthy of his lover.

According to legend, he slew a dragon that was attacking a lion, killed a giant cow on Dunsmore Heath near Dunchurch, and hunted a great boar which had eyes like “blazing beacons” and tusks like “fiery bulwarks”.

He also defeated the Danish giant Colbrand in a duel near Winchester Abbey after returning from a pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

A statue of him with a giant boar now stands proud on the approach to Warwick.

'Guy Fawkes House' Dunchurch

Guy Fawkes

The plot to blow up the House of Parliament using barrels of gunpowder is deeply rooted in Warwickshire.

The plan was to kill King James and kidnap the heir to the throne, Princess Elizabeth, based at Coombe Abbey near Coventry, so they could marry her to a Catholic and place her on the throne.

The plot was hatched at the Manor House in Ashby St Ledgers, near Rugby, by Robert Catesby, who gathered a group of followers, including the Throckmorton family who lived at Coughton Court near Alcester, and John Grant, lord of the manor of Northbrook, which included Clopton House in Stratford.

Many meetings were held at The Bull Inn, in Coventry, and the Red Lion Inn in Dunchurch.

As we all know the plot failed and the conspirators were either killed running away, or arrested and executed.

Churchill and The Coventry Blitz

It’s nearly 75 years since German bombers destroyed much of the city centre, but did prime minister Winston Churchill know about the attack beforehand?

The myth is that the Churchill knew that the city was to be targeted by the Luftwaffe but he didn’t want to alert Adolf Hilter that the Allies had cracked the Nazi’s top-secret Enigma code.

The theory, that lives on to this day, suggests that Coventry was sacrificed for the ‘greater good’ and the benefits of the long-term outweighed the short-term costs of leaving the city to its terrible fate.

There is some scepticism about the conspiracy among historians who suggest that Churchill could not have known about the fate that beheld Coventry.

The thought is that London was the target and that there was little the authorities could have done to protect the people of the city even if they had been forewarned.

Wroth Silver

Villagers gather at dawn every November 11 in a field near Stretton-on-Dunsmore to take part in a centuries-old ceremony.

People living in 25 Warwickshire parishes meet a representative of the Duke of Buccleuch on a raised hillock at Knightlow Hill to perform the ancient Wroth Silver ceremony, which has been conducted on almost every Martinmas since 1170.

The ceremony sees the parishes of the Knighlow Hundred placing coins in a hollow stone. It was probably a form of taxation but what it is exactly for has been lost in the realms of history. The coins have little or no value today, but the ceremony remains to keep the tradition alive.

Holy Grail

An amateur historian believes he found the Holy Grail in Warwickshire.

Dr Graham Phillips spent seven years tracking down the potential relic to a house near Rugby - where it was kept in a box in a loft.

The find was a small green onyx cup of possible Roman origin which Dr Phillips has linked to the Grail - the cup used to collect Christ’s blood and taken to Britain in the early 5th century to protect it from barbarians.

The cup’s owner’s grandfather had originally discovered the vessel in a cave at Hawstone Park in Shropshire.

Battling for control of the ball in the Atherstone Ball Game

Atherstone Ball Game

Played annually on Shrove Tuesday since the 12th Century, this traditional football game is a free-for-all played along Watling Stree at the point where it joins the main street of Atherstone.

A specifically made ball, decorated with red, white and blue ribbons, is thrown out of a window by a prominent personality to begin the match between hundreds of players of all ages that lasts for around two hours. There are no teams, and no goals, while the only rule is that players are not allowed to kill one another.

The winner is whoever manages to hold onto the ball at the end of the game. They get to keep the ball as their prize. Its orgin goes back to the reign of King John with the original game played between Warwickshire and Leicestershire on Shrove Tuesday.

The Beast of Barford

Something big was prowling the Warwickshire countryside in 2004 and there is even a paw print as proof.

The five-inch long and four-inch wide print was discovered on a farmland at Wasperton Farm, in Barford, south of Warwick after a panther-like animal was spotted snatching a pheasant.

It shows three huge claws and a large pad on the back and wildlife experts believe it is the most conclusive print that big cats roam, or did roam, Warwickshire.

Casts of the mysterious print are now on show at the Warwick museum but as yet there there is no further proof of the Beast of Barford.